Renovation continued...

Here's the t.v. wall with the little cubby that will hold the t.v. and its accoutrements. Don built the cable and a couple of outlets in there so it will (hopefully) look tidy. Two sconces will go in those two circles on either side of the t.v. The hanging lamp will be moved...



Here are the other two walls, just to give you an idea of the color of the room. It's a taupe-y color, definitely with a hint of pink. I think it looks great with the flooring, as well as the kitchen counters.

Don needs to trim the windows and the put the baseboards back in, and the room will at least be usable. There is still painting to do in that room, and then we'll work on furnishing it.

Our other project...

I know this will come as a shock to most people. In fact, no one could have been more shocked than Don or me, or the urologist who just did Don's vasectomy in October!

We knew we were expecting for awhile, but didn't know how far along I was until I had my ultrasound appointment this afternoon. I am around 7 1/2 weeks along, and due around October 11.

Don and I are slowly finding peace with our new reality, and we're firm in our faith that God is in control and knows what He is doing.

Scope Creep

If there's one thing that Don and I are really good at, it's scope creep. As in, you start with a minor, easy, inexpesive, short, simple construction project. Then, you slowly but surely improve your project until it's difficult, expensive, lengthy, and complicated! Oh, and better. Much better.

Now, to be honest, I am the one who is usual guilty of coming up with the brilliant ideas that add to the scope creep. Don, who wants nothing more than to make me happy, and who is capable of just about anything construction-wise, always manages to make my ideas actually happen.

This is our new living area, in the suite that Don and Waneta recently vacated. They had the windows replaced a year ago, but never finished the sheetrock because they didn't want to put up with the construction mess. Who could blame them?

So, Don and I started out with this list of what we had to do to finish this room: tape and mud the sheetrock, sand, prime, paint. Voila!

Until I decided that it would be cool to get a flat-screen tv and hang it on the wall, making this the boys' ultimate hang-out room. I asked Don to remove several windows on one wall and turn that into a real wall. It was Don's idea to build a little nook in the wall for the t.v. and components to sit in, so they wouldn't take up any space in the little room.

We decided to get a small big t.v. to keep the expenses down, etc. We decided 32 inch. The boys are used to a 27 inch t.v., so we figured that was plenty big. But there was scope creep there, too. Yesterday Don went into town around noon. At four, I started getting nervous and suspicious. Sure enough, he came home all sheepish with a 42-inch t.v. from Costco. Apparently a great deal, not that he would tell me the price, but I'm thinking it was considerably more than the 32-inch.

We'll be working on this house forever.

Dinner with Madilyn Rae

Oh yeah, and all of her adoring public!

She was absolutely perfect last night. She slept soundly all through supper. We had to wake her up at the very end so that we could snuggle her up and take these photos. She's very cuddly. And wonderful. Ahhhhh....

Food

In case you didn't know, I'm in the middle of a "Biggest Loser" contest at an internet message board that I post at. Just like the t.v. program, the stakes are high. Everyone chipped in $20 at the beginning, bringing the pot to a whopping $300. Everyone sent in initial weights, and then we weigh in every Monday a.m. The person to lose the biggest percentage of their body weight by the end of the 12th week wins the pot.

I am currently in the lead at the end of the 6th week, but not by a wide margin! I have lost a little over 8.5%, and another woman is right behind me at almost 8%.

My strategy is simple. I eat according to the South Beach diet principles. And I don't cheat. Okay, I cheated one time in the past 6 weeks, so it's not even worth mentioning, right?

Here's what I eat: breakfast is always steel-cut oats cooked in water and skim milk, topped with splend, plus coffee with skim milk; lunch is a sandwich with cheddar cheese, avacado, tomato, lettuce, and peppers on either 1/2 bagel or 2 pieces of whole-grain bread, depending on what's for supper; supper is some sort of yummy protein (tonight is roast in the crock pot), a salad, a veggie, and a grain. I only eat the grain if it is brown rice, or whole-grain pasta. If I'm hungry in the afternoon, I'll eat a piece of whole-grain toast with peanut butter.

So, I'm basically limiting my grains to 2 or 3 servins/day, and avoiding all white flour. No potatoes, no white rice, and no grains alone. The idea behind SBD is that you want to keep your stomach busy digesting as long as possible. Adding a protein, like the peanut butter on the toast, slows down the digestion process considerably.

I'm eating lots of calories, and I'm not hungry. But I am losing weight...I've averaged 2 pounds/week during this contest. And I feel great. Cutting the refined sugars and flours helps you lose weight and feel better.

Wish me luck on the home stretch of my Biggest Loser contest! The money will come in very handy on this weekend.

Valentine's Fun

This morning I took the girls to Storytime at the Library. They heard stories, sang songs, did some crafts (including making these glasses), and then all got stamps on their hands and a goody-bag of candy! If we go again, I think the girls are going to have pretty high expectations from that candy bag. Afterward, we played on the playground for just a few minutes because, even though the sun was out, it was freezing.

Don is out running errands with Jordyn. Dylan and Nathan are getting haircuts after school, and the rest of us are just hanging out here.

Music to a Mom's Ears...

...is wafting upstairs from the wee room that now houses the Foosball table. At the table, Nathan and Dylan are screaming and yelling, but not swearing, through a viscious Foosball battle. It's so nice that they're able to enjoy each other's company like this. We are fortunate.

Our Magnificent Weekend of 2008

Remember our lovely Victoria weekend that we spent with Frank and Heather last year? Remember how it nearly killed our childcare providers? Remember how we (as in the 4 who were in Victoria) had so much fun we decided that we needed to spend another long weekend together in 2008?

Well, guess what Heather and I just did this evening?

Here's a hint:

That's right! We just booked a 3-day Carnival cruise to Mexico in May. Ahhhhh....I'm already starting to relax just knowing that in three short months we'll be living the good life off the shore of Baja California.

We're using airmiles to fly from Seattle to Los Angeles, so it really will be a whirl-wind trip. We leave Friday a.m. and get back Monday night.

More good news on the subject: my incredible, magnificent parents are returning to take care of the girls. Don and I were willing to just leave the girls with the boys, but Mom and Lee didn't feel comfortable with that. Now, I know that if we left the girls with the boys, no one would have a good weekend (except Don and me), and none of the kids would like each other by Monday night, and the house would be a disaster area, but really, I think the girls would be okay. Like, they wouldn't be needing medical attention or anything... But really and truly, everyone will be happier to have Grandma and Grandpa here.

Whole foods at my fingertips...

Now, I know this won't be an interesting entry for many people, so feel free to skip it and go watch Jordyn's montage below : )


I used to store all of these foods in my pantry in Tupperware canisters, but I found it cumbersome to make several trips back and forth from the pantry to the counter. So when I got gift cards to Ikea for Christmas, I started a collection of these glass apothecary canisters and put my most-used ingredients in them. This morning Dylan and I went shopping at Canadian SuperStore and I bought some more for a great price.

With this setup, I can whip up pancakes, waffles, bread dough, and even lots of dinners without stepping away from the counter once. And, because I want my canisters and their beautiful contents to be the focal-point of my kitchen, it motivates me to keep the counters clean.

In addition to this little bit of organization and the grocery shopping, I covered my grey, chauffered Sean from a cadet activity to a birthday party, and dyed Nathan's comforter covers teal to help his room look more like a Shark Tank. And all this while Don puts in his second 10-hour day in a row. Tonight's supper: leftovers.

Have a lovely weekend.

Happy Birthday, Miss Jordyn!

Here, for your viewing pleasure, is Jordyn's first two years in photos.

Enjoy!

Guess who won...

...the Best New Entry award at the cadets semi-annual review last night?




OC Murphy! This award has been given out since 1961 and there are three names on the trophy from cadets who are now commanders in the Canadian Navy. It's very cool that Sean's name will be among them!

BIG HOUSE!

Last week was bittersweet in that Don and Waneta came back to Aldergrove to pack up the last of their stuff. It was sad to see them go and we will miss them very much. Patience went into their empty suite and said, "Where's Grandpa's chair?" There is NO furniture at all anywhere, and she asked about the chair that she sat in with her grandpa. I told her that all of their stuff was now in their big house, and she said, "I don't want them to move to their big house. I want them to stay in their little house down the hall." She always enjoyed visiting Waneta and having "tea," or sitting with Don and watching t.v.

We moved Dylan in during the week last week. He had no school Thursday or Friday due to semester break.

On Saturday, Don and Nathan went to Langley to pick up the double bed that Dorothy gave us for Sean's room. He was gone all day to a cadet self-defense workshop, so he came home to his room all ready to move into.

I did some shopping in Langley on Saturday to buy a birthday gift, and I ended up in Michael's in their art/frame section. They were having a 60% off sale on their large frames so I purchased quite a few. Now all the kids' posters and pictures are in proper frames instead of just being taped to the wall. Looks much better. I framed Dylan's trumpet picture and bought him two other prints and frames. They look fantastic in his moss-colored room. I bought Sean frames for his swimming and basketball frames and purchased him another gorgeous print and frame that match his teal-colored room perfectly. Framed artwork make their rooms look so much more put together.

Yesterday after church we had a "Murphy family work party" and made some changes to the basement that used to house all three boys.

The little room that used to be Sean's was empty. So we moved the Foosball table from the shop, where it had been stored for two years, into that room. And that's all that's in there! How funny going from practically stacking our children to now having a room dedicated to a Foosball table!

The room that Dylan and Nathan used to share is now Nathan's. He has two twin beds and two armoirs, so he has lots of room for his "stuff." We framed and hung his Sharks posters, hung up a coat rack for him, and just generally got him organized. It's a shame he has so little time to enjoy having his own space, but we're encouraging him to make the most of it during his last five months at home.

Renovations continue as quickly as Don can fit in the work, as he's already working full-time at the computer stuff. He's concentrating on finishing the living space of the suite right now. When we had the windows replaced two Christmases ago, the sheetrock never did get mudded and taped. So he'll do that and then we'll paint the rest of the suite and hallway. The bathroom down there (now the boys' bathroom) needs a bit of work. Then we'll move upstairs and do some work up here. More on that later.

Last night when we went to bed, I told Don that it felt so strange to have our family so spread out!

A couple of pictures...

Patience and Nathan play hockey together. Patience got this little hockey stick for Christmas. Jordyn got a Diego one, but she's not as much of a hockey aficionado as Patience is. When Nathan was in California a couple of weeks ago, he found a smiliar stick, but a Shark stick, of course. So he and Patience play in the hallway pretty much on a daily basis. Here she is "in net." Notice how difficult it will be for Nathan to score?

Nathan really really really wants to get Patience into hockey. He says she'll make a great defender based on her ballet class.

Here's Jordyn very focused on feeding Danica's dolly. Danica got this baby doll for her birthday and brought it to our house yesterday. All three girls took turns looking after this very realistic baby (it must weigh at least 5 pounds, and feels pretty real when you're holding it).

It's been very cold here. Like minus 10, or 20 F, however you think of temperature. We woke up this a.m. to about 4 inches of snow, and it was still falling. But because this is a Provincial Exam day, schools were open regardless. Except for the preschool. The girls can't understand why I won't let them play outside... It reminds me of the time when Val and I begged and begged and pleaded to go swimming in my grandparents' outdoor swimming pool...in March or some silly month like that. My mom finally broke down and let us get in while my grandmother ran a hot tub for us. Yep, it wasn't much fun and we decided maybe we didn't want to go swimming anymore after about 60 seconds or so!

Saturday, January 26, 2008

I couldn't think of a catchy title : )

Last night Sean had four friends from school over for a small birthday party. These are the same four who came over last year. They are all a year older, but not any quieter! But at least I am a year smarter and demanded that it would not be a "slumber" party like he had last year. Don drove the guests home at 10:00 although they were all so wired and hyper I'm sure sleep was a loooooong way off. Oh well, at least they were at their own homes : )

You can go back to my January 2007 entries to see this same shot last year.

This morning I took Patience to "ballet school." She did great! As she told her dad when he asked how school was, "It was good! I didn't knock anyone over!"

After ballet we went grocery shopping. Both girls are napping right now, and Patience is going to Danica's 3rd birthday party this afternoon. Let's hope she doesn't knock anyone over there, either. As far as I can remember, this is her first birthday party!

While Patience and I were gone this a.m., Don showed Dylan how to change electrical outlets. We wanted to replace all the outlets in their new rooms from offwhite to white, to match the white trim. Dylan was able to do them all! I told him it was a good skill to have, because someday his wife was going to want to change all their outlets to suit her fancy and he could either do it himself for $20 or he could hire an electrician to do it for around $500. He said that since he would be busy working, he would just teach his wife to do it herself! That's my boy. Chivalry is not dead...

Nathan has three provincial exams this week and Dylan has two. They both have Thursday and Friday off, but Don has work scheduled for both of them, so it'll be a "working holiday." Oh well, they can both use the money so it's nice they have a source for work.

That's all for now!

Cathi

iPod update...

There is only one person on this planet who could have taken that iPod back to Best Buy because it was within the 30-day purchase period: Don.

Technically, it wasn't even in the 30-day period because we purchased it on the 19th, but Don reasoned with the manager that it was a Christmas present so it wasn't opened until the 25th, etc.

I told Dylan he had used up all his good luck and to not even bother playing the lottery any time soon!

iPods no longer work...

...when you put them through the washer and dryer.

Two in a row!

Amazing, I know : )

Today was pajama day at Patience and Danica's preschool so here they are all ready to go with jammies and their Max and Ruby stuffed animals:

I have a picture of the two of them awhile back on this blog holding the same toys...they sure have grown up!

Tonight is Cadets and Sean would like Don and I to go watch the Colors Parade (where they march and raise the flags, etc) because he is now officially a member of the guard and will be marching (hopefully in unison) with them.

Recently I made homemade syrup! We were running low, and I remembered how my mom always made her own. Sure enough, Google will bring up hundreds of recipes and it's easy as all get out! I did have to buy maple flavoring, but I can make for 80 cents syrup that would cost more than $3 to buy. Oh, and the kids think it's better than the store-bought stuff...bonus!

First entry of the year...

Pretty embarassing considering it's the 21st today!

My mother gently reminded me that it was Sean's 13th birthday yesterday, so surely I could at least post a picture? Of course...here is Sean guarding his birthday cake from Jordyn:





Notice how he's holding her hand in an attempt to guard his oreos?

So, other news about Sean's birthday: he got pancakes for breakfast, lovely gifts including an MP3 player, more software for his FLY pen, office supplies and cash from Grandma and Grandpa Lee, candy from Nathan and Dylan, and cash from Grandma and Grandpa Murphy. He's going to bank most of the cash, and buy a Nintendo memory card with the rest.

We went to church yesterday, and then came home to homemade pizza and a play date with Sean's good friend Daniel. Dinner was crepes, and then we had this lovely cake with ice cream for dessert.

On other subjects, Don and I spent a lot of time this weekend painting Dylan's and Sean's new bedrooms in the east wing of the house. They turned out really well and we're hoping to have them moved in next weekend. We're just priming and painting the trim and doors right now. I'll post pictures as soon as we're done.

Here is a picture of Jordyn with her clown nose that Don brought home from his trip to California last weekend:




And here's a picture of Patience and Jordyn all ready for bed recently:




Patience started ballet classes on Saturday. It's a Parks and Rec class for 3-6 year olds. It's very cute and very funny to watch the girls "dance." I had to explain to Patience after the class that ballet is not a contact sport. The teacher had all the girls "dance" to the music and all the other girls danced in a clockwise direction around the room. Patience danced counter-clockwise. With her eyes closed, because she thinks that is how ballerinas dance. That's probably how Angelina Ballerina does it on t.v. Anyway, it looked like a game of pinball, with little tiny girls in tutus getting flattened by Patience the Huge. The other parents thankfully didn't seem to hold it against her because a) their tiny daughters didn't seem to get hurt, and b) it was so darn funny. I told Don he's taking her next week.


So, yeah, the renovations are taking most of our spare time and money.


Nathan is working hard to get back on track with school. He promised (again) that he was all caught up in his classes and was passing them all. But this time I told him I needed written proof from his teachers before he sets foot on the basketball court. On a bright note, Nathan is really getting set up to join the Coast Guard. He ordered a set of books that will help him get through bootcamp and he's been doing a lot of online research. I think he'll do well regardless because he's in such awesome physical shape, he's got his Sea Cadet background so much of what he'll learn there (seamanship wise) he'll already know, and he's used to living with strict rules and people who will yell if the rules arent' followed. In fact, he'll probably feel right at home.

Dyland and Nathan are in their last week of school fo this semester. Dylan is working hard to improve his science grade by 2 percent to bump him from a B to an A.


I'll post more later. I promise!

Our Photo Montage...

Enjoy!
http://www.onetruemedia.com/shared?p=48e68526e63d9fb8ef7391&skin_id=701&utm_source=otm&utm_medium=text_url

December Update

Hi All! Thanks for your patience as I'm so slow at updating. Here are a few pictures for your enjoyment. The first two are a couple of big trees that we sold out of the yard this year. I'm glad I'm not involved with setting them up and decorating them!









And here's a shot of Patience taking a nap. Everyday I make her a nice "flat" bed on our couch with her fleece blanket, her bear comforter, her pillow, her night-night, and her babies. She usually sleeps flat. Today I came into the living room to find this:




I hope she doesn't wake up with a crook in her neck!

We've been busy getting Christmas shopping done. I've been out late shopping with Dylan one evening and Nathan last night. Some stores are open 24 hours which is crazy, but I have to admit, helpful too. Last night I officially finished my shopping. I know I'm done because I spent almost every cent that was in my wallet. Yep, right down to the dimes. I'm sure the cashier was not impressed, but at least my wallet was much lighter.

Now I'm wrapping things and putting them under our undecorated tree. For the past several years, I haven't decorated a tree with our own ornaments. I've always patiently waited for the farm to close and then I'd (meaning Don) bring in a tree that Waneta had already decorated for the yard. I just had to plug it in and we'd have instant Christmas. This year we wanted to use a tree that Don had grown himself down at Radnai's (our lease property). It's a beautiful, tall Noble fir. And it's a good thing it's beautiful, because we can't find our Christmas tree ornaments or lights! I'm sure they're around here somewhere, but until we find them, our tree is naked. With the exception of the snowman ornaments that the girls made last week.

I'm thinking of making it an activity for the kids to make up some sort of decorations, like stringing popcorn or cutting out snowflakes, or something!

Patience had her Christmas party at preschool today. It was cute and fun and there were lots of sibling babies there. Two sets of twins, including my friend's twin boys...one of which I got to hold : ). Now she's on Christmas break. The boys have to go to school tomorrow and then they're on Christmas break for two weeks.

Saturday my mom will be flying up to the PNW, but is staying with my sister until Christmas day. We're hoping my dad will be able to spend Christmas with us this year as well. It's been ages since we've been together at Christmas time...probably around 10!

More later!
Love,
Cathi